Seek, and ye shall find...
What's eating my plant? A quick organic pest identifier
Squiggly lines? White fluff? Sticky curled leaves? Match the symptom to the culprit, then jump to the fix. Your one-stop “what is wrong with my plant” guide.
Before you spray anything, stop and look. The single most useful pest-control skill is simply identifying what you’re dealing with — because the fix for a sap-sucking aphid is very different from the fix for a fungal wilt. The good news: most home-garden troubles fall into just six familiar culprits, and each leaves a tell-tale calling card.
Use the symptom list below to find your suspect, then follow the link to the full guide on dealing with it organically. And remember the golden rule from every experienced gardener: you’ll never eliminate every pest, and you don’t need to. A few nibbled leaves are the price of a living, balanced garden — you’re only stepping in when something tips out of balance.
Match the symptom to the pest
- Tiny green/black bugs + sticky, curling leaves — Aphids — sap-suckers that cluster on new growth
- Squiggly pale tunnels winding through the leaf — Leaf miners — fly larvae feeding inside the leaf
- White cottony fluff under leaves and on stems — Mealybugs (or clouds of tiny white flies = whiteflies)
- Silvery, scarred, distorted leaves; tiny slivers that fly up — Thrips — they also spread viruses
- Whole plant suddenly droops and collapses — Wilt — a fungal or bacterial disease in the soil
- White powdery or fuzzy patches on leaves — Mildew — powdery, downy or sooty fungus
- Many tiny round “shot-holes”, little beetles that jump — Flea beetles — a post-monsoon/winter leafy-green pest
Frequently asked questions
How do I know if it’s a pest or a disease?
Pests (aphids, mealybugs, thrips, leaf miners) are insects you can usually see or whose feeding you can spot. Diseases (wilt, mildew) are fungal or bacterial — look for powder, rot, or sudden whole-plant collapse with no insect in sight.
There are squiggly white lines on my leaves — what is it?
Leaf miners: the larvae of small flies tunnelling inside the leaf. Mostly cosmetic unless widespread.
What is the white cottony stuff on my plant?
Almost certainly mealybugs — soft, sap-sucking insects that hide as white cottony masses under leaves and on stems.
My whole plant wilted overnight — why?
If the soil is moist but the plant has collapsed, suspect a fungal or bacterial wilt. Remove and destroy affected plants before it spreads, and rotate your crops.